The Bhagavad-Gita discusses five topics: Isvara,
the Supreme Controller; jiva, the living
entity; prakriti, material nature; kala,
time; and karma, activities. The living entities, material
nature, and time are eternal energies of the Lord. Karma, however, is not eternal.
"Karma" means matrial activities or work and its results, or action
and reaction.
Please also see: "The Law of Cause
and Effect".

Although we are reaping the results of our material activities from time immemorial,
we can change our karma. Change is possible when we become situated in the mode
of goodness, in sanity, and understand what sort of activities we should adopt.
If we do that, then all the actions and reactions connected to our past activities
can be changed.

Three types of Karma

1.

karma

work done as fruitive activity in accordance with
scriptural injunctions

2.

vikarma

sinful works, done against the injunctions of the
religious scriptures

3.

akarma

work which dont incure karmic reactions

The Law of Karma states, that every
living entity has to suffer or enjoy the reactions of his work, whether good or
bad. In order to avoid bad karma one must know to work properly, without incurring
negative results. Otherwise, if one does not know how to work in a genuine way
he will be entangled in the unwanted results produce by his activities and thus
suffer the consequences.

One should know what the right kind of work is to be done, and one should know
what is not to be done. One should therefore understand the difference between
karma, akarma und vikarma, or the tree types of work, before one starts his activities.
Also one should understand how ones activities are influenced by the three gunas,
or the three modes of nature.

Regulated activities, as prescribed in the scriptures [karma],
in terms of the different orders and divisions of society, performed without attachment
or proprietary rights and therefore without love or hatred, and performed for
the service of the Lord, without self-gratification, are called actions in the
mode of goodness. [Bg 18.23] By acting in the mode of
goodness, which brings happiness, the living entity gets illuminated with knowledge
of self-realization and thus can free himself from the miseries experienced in
the hard struggle for material existence. Such activities lead the performer to
the heavenly planets for prolonged sensual enjoyment. However, when a person's
pious credits are exhausted, he must return to Earth, just as a person returns
from a holiday and resumes his work.

Sinful activities, or work done against
the injunctions of the religious scriptures, as well as activities which inflict
pain on other living entities is called vikarma. Such
activities performed without consideration of future bondage or consequences is
considered to be work in ignorance. [Bg 18.25-28] Activities
in the mode of ignorance leads to unhappiness, frustration, delusion and degrades
the living entity to the hellish planets or a lower species of life. Then one
has to work one's way up the evolutionary ladder to regain a human form of life.
There are 8,400,000 species of life, but only 400,000 are human varieties, so
vikarma is very risky.

Works which don't incur karmic reactions is called akarma.
Such activities are able to free one from the cycle of birth and death, because
such activities are spiritual in nature, and are dedicated to the Supreme Lord.
Devotional Service, done for the Lord, is called Bhakti. A devotee engaged in
bhakti-yoga does not get any karmic reaction for his
service, because is spiritual and completely transcendental to the three modes
of material nature. A person working in devotion for the Supreme Lord is said
to be a worker for whom the reactions of work have been burned up by the fire
of perfect knowledge"
[Bg. 4.19].

All material activities involve actions and reactions in the
three modes of material nature and are carried out in goodness, passion
or ignorance, or a combination of these. See also: the three
gunas. According to the mixture of the three modes of material nature,the
living entity is subjected to the particular results of his actions.

As long as one is not liberated from material nature, one has to perform his duties
according to religious principles and in this way gradually rise to the platform
of real knowledge. "According to the three modes of material nature and the
work associated with them, the four divisions of human society are created by
Me," Krishna says [Bg. 4.13]. The four divisions
are the brahmanas, the intelligent class, situated in the mode of goodness; the
ksatriyas, the military and administrative class, in the mode of passion; vaisyas,
the mercantile class, in mixed passion and ignorance; and sudras, the working
class, in the mode of ignorance. Every civilized human fits into one of these
categories, but not according to birth; it depends on one's personal qualities
and work.

"By following his qualities of work, every man can become perfect,"
Krishna says [Bg. 18.45]. "One who performs his
duty without attachment, surrendering the results unto the Supreme Lord, is unaffected
by sinful action, as the lotus leaf is untouched by water," says the Bhagavad-Gita
[5.10]. By work directed toward the highest perfection
of self-realization understanding one's constitutional position as Krishna's eternal
servitor one's karma ceases to exist.

In order to avoid bad karmic reactions we do not have to cease all activities
and become inert like stones. Rather our activities and consciousness has to be
changed, namely from material to spiritual. Spiritual activities done in purified
consciousness can liberate the living entities. If one works in materialistic
consciousness, one will be bound up to the material world and suffer the consequences.
But if one works in spiritual consciousness one can stop karmic reactions and
free himself from the repeated circle of birth and death.